1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a means for preparing sewing data for an automatic sewing machine in which sewing data for controlling the cloth feeding of the automatic sewing machine is written in a storage medium.
2. Background Art
As is well known in the art, many industrial electric sewing machines include an automatic sewing mechanism having a memory which stores programmed sewing data for automatically controlling the cloth or sewing needle according to a predetermined sewing pattern based on stored sewing data, to thereby allow automatic sewing of the cloth in a desired pattern. The sewing data is written in a storage medium in the memory. The storage medium is replaceable with another storage medium such that different sewing patterns can be easily selected as desired for sewing operations. As a result, the sewing machine can save labor and can be operated at an increased speed. The storage medium may be a semiconductor memory such as a PROM or a magnetic card on which a desired sewing pattern, sewing speed and other control data are stored in the order of sewing operations.
Namely, the sewing data is composed of control commands such as an amount of relative displacement between the sewing needle and the cloth for each stitching, a sewing speed and other movement. Control information for a single sewing pattern is composed of a collection of control commands, each for one stitching sequence. For automatic sewing of a desired pattern on an automatic sewing machine of the type described, it is therefore necessary to prepare and then enter such sewing data in a given storage medium.
A conventional technique of preparing such data has included the steps of lighting or flashing light emitting diodes displaying the operation order, contacting a stylus pen or cursor to a pattern input section in the order according to the display of the diode, and preparing the sewing data according to a given sewing pattern. Such a conventional technique is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,446,520 to Shigeta et al, incorporated herein by reference, of which the present invention can be considered an improvement.
The conventional technique, however, is deficient in that the space of the display section becomes large as it is required to display the numerous operation sequences.